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Second Chance

Jane

My junior year, it all fell apart. Dealing with all the hurt, the loneliness and confusion pushed me to take the pills...A neverending fog, not knowing a way out, feeling as though life had nothing to offer, that I was just a cosmic joke created by God for his amusement, feeling that death would offer endless supply of better alternatives to life.

This is the way I thought and felt growing up, through middle school and high school, even though I came from a loving family that believed in and taught me that we have hope in God and through his Son, Jesus' death on the cross. But somehow, I didn't connect that hope as the answer to my constant despair.

Because of the depression, the sense of unconnectedness from anyone or anything that really mattered, I spiraled down for several years, sometimes hitting rock bottom, working my way back up, and then attempting to end my life as things spiraled down.

The hardest point to deal with occurred in college, my junior year. I thought I'd finally escaped the crushing feelings of despair that I'd had growing up. I'd had success in my major, I was engaged to a man I loved, I had a great job, and a ton of close friends.

Then it all fell apart my junior year. A friend from childhood was killed in a car accident. A few weeks later, one of my close friends and I got into a fight and stopped talking. A few days after that, I received a call from my parents telling me that my dad was ill and would be undergoing tests, they weren't sure what was wrong with him. I was suffering from major migraines all during this period. My grades and work really began to suffer, but I thought, well it will all be alright, as long as I have my fiance. I was struggling with hiding everything and staying focused while all this was going on and I prayed that God might intervene, set things right somehow. Two weeks later, my fiance called to tell me that he had been cheating on me for two months with one of my best friends.

At that point, I decided that I didn't need a God who would throw everything I trusted in away. I began to trust in other things, alcohol, drugs, and relationships. By the end of the semester however, I began to break down, I hated myself for the things I had done. I felt that I had nothing worth living for.

If God had not intervened in my life, I would not be alive today. My family and friends would have suffered greatly, and there's no doubt in my mind that I would not have been in heaven.

One night, I started to take some of the pills I had lying around with the intention of overdosing. God alone saved my life that night causing me to fall asleep before I could take enough pills to do major damage. At that point, I knew I needed something more in my life, something more than a ticket out of hell. I poured my whole heart and story out to a co-worker and friend, Chrissanna, right before Christmas Break and she shared with me that God and Christ were more than salvation after death, that they were strength for our walk through life, and the only unfailing thing that we could place our trust in fully.

I was still skeptical after everything that had happened, but I realized that I never had had true control over my life, and that the things I had depended on for so long would fail me again and again. Two weeks later, on Christmas Eve, I confessed everything to God, shared the pain of my heart with him, told him that I had always believed in him and his salvation, but that I needed him in my life, not just in my death. I gave him control of my life then.

Since then, Christ has been helping me to overcome my fears and despairing doubts. More and more, I'm learning to make my steadfast savior my priority and my hope. I've found that I can pray to him at all times of the day, and give him the anxieties that I place on myself. He's helped me to surrender the pain of the last three years to him, and to finally speak out and share it with others. And the one thing I was always afraid of and ran from, sharing his love with others and the idea of ministry, is now a desire of my heart. I no longer feel alone, as he has not only demonstrated his love to me through his Spirit working in me, but also through providing me with close friends who understand not only pain, but that God can turn that into joy. Though I will never be perfect in this until he brings me home to heaven someday, I desire to live trusting Him and following his will as that has brought me the most peace and joy.